Manchester-based Zaptic, a Connected Worker Platform that provides job instruction and collaboration for frontline teams, announced on Tuesday that it has secured $10M (approximately €9.04M) in a Series A round of funding.
This round brings Zaptic’s total raised capital to $16M.
The round was led by Molten Ventures, a venture capital firm investing in and developing high-growth technology businesses across Europe. The round also saw participation from existing investors.
With this investment, Molten Ventures will be joining Zaptic’s board of directors.
Capital utilisation
Zaptic says it will use the funds to continue its growth, expand into new markets and new verticals, and further develop its no-code platform which helps manufacturers close the skills gap and digitise daily operations, closing the data loop and bringing in application of AI in factories.
Zaptic and Molten Ventures will work together to scale Zaptic’s solution to help 700 million industrial workers across global supply chains to operate ‘flawlessly’.
Richard Milnes, Zaptic’s CEO, says, “We are seeing huge demand from manufacturers looking for solutions to help them transform their operations in the face of increasing pressures and a worsening skills gap.”
“This investment from Molten Ventures will allow us to scale our business to meet that demand and continue to invest deeply into creating an operational knowledge layer for workers, with operational data enabled by AI.”
What does Zaptic offer?
Founded in 2015 by Richard Milnes and Sandy Reid, Zaptic is a connected worker platform that offers frontline staff job training, collaboration tools, and a no-code toolkit to accelerate the digital transformation of everyday business operations.
It does this via a guided workflow – operator help at the task level – and a no-code platform that aligns human and machine reference data for context specificity, closing the loop between human activity and assets, and maximising machine learning insight and adaption.
Currently, manufacturers such as Carlsberg, Hovis, Berry Global, and Celgard use Zaptic as part of their transformation activities, digitising operations for frontline teams and accelerating operational excellence journeys.
The company’s aim is to serve as the operating system for frontline execution, sharing knowledge and best practices, both inside and across businesses, to raise standards and boost employee efficiency throughout supply chains.
In 2022 alone, Zaptic’s platform enabled clients to accomplish over 3 million activities, resulting in overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) improvements of over 10 per cent and downtime reductions of up to 20 per cent.
Recently, the company strengthened its execution and task management skills for coordinating front-line staff by introducing “guides”. It lets users collect and exchange information regarding equipment, production lines, and job duties on the job site.
This enables operators to follow standard operating procedures in real time, at the point of use with the option to troubleshoot further instructions, delegate additional tasks to the maintenance, quality or safety teams as necessary, and monitor tasks until completion.
Zaptic says these kinds of product enhancements yield measurable outcomes that enable its clients to onboard employees over 35 per cent quicker while upping worker capacity by up to 20 per cent.
Enhancing FDA compliance
Zaptic claims to help businesses stay compliant without impeding innovation or productivity since it recognises that its clients will be subject to more regulatory scrutiny.
Recently developed product solutions that guarantee compliance with audit records will remain a priority, says the company. Zaptic is committed to provide a solution that will be used in-line with Current Good Manufacturing Practice (CGMP) as outlined by the FDA.
In order to maintain its position in the industry and to continue giving employees and customers the most context-rich knowledge, Zaptic says it will invest in product development and in leadership and talent across functions, especially in sales, product and engineering.
